cincinnadio

This is my response to a recent blog posted by Sara at www.saraknowsbest.com
Why are you still reading this? You should be at www.saraknowsbest.com you dumbass!

Ok. This is an exact copy of the comment I left there, so you may have already read it. Talk about effortless blog reading. I made it easy for you this time. ok, so give me more Cincinnati radio insight if you have it.

"
If you ever worked somewhere where all they did was play the same radio station all day, you'd really hate the wiz. and all other radio stations for that matter, other than NPR. And doesn't the new Mojo play Soul now? Isn't that pretty rad? I've only heard it for a few minutes but the first song was pretty jammin.

so here's my new formula for Cincinnat radio satisfaction:
Toggle between the new mojo for the occasional danceable soul song, 97.3 for some blind melon and candelbox (maybe you prefer depeche mode and the cure?). Hit up the wiz when you must, but don't forget about the 88's. 88.3 and 88.7 or whatever. WAIF and whatever the other one is play some interesting stuff sometimes. Also, and bear with me on this one, Q102. They've been playing some decent 90's hits these days. A couple weeks ago there was at least 4 songs in a row that I could bear, even 'jam' to. They included Baby Got Back by Sir Mix a lot and I Saw the Sign by Ace of Base. Not songs I'd usually listen to, but given the condition of Cincinnati radio, you have to give Q102 credit for deviating a little...or maybe it's just that they haven't changed their playlists in 10-15 years, so they're coming back into style a little bit.And it doesn't hurt to listen to NPR when you have time, to find programs that you like. Then you can remember what time that show is on, and you can listen to it instead of garbage when you have to make some half hour drive across town. hope this helps.
"
Love, the city

Nothing Too Serious...

here's an ancient American Proverb:
Chicago winter blows. It's windy, and it sucks.

Last year I drove to Chicago around this time by myself to see Laura Veirs somewhere in Lincoln Park. Let me tell you, it was cold as Antarctica's ass. I froze my dick off.

no seriously...my dick is somewhere on a Chicago sidewalk or frozen still to the bottom of a bum's shoe.

OK, so I wanted to mention some of the music that I've been listening to a lot lately. Here's a list. You should check some out.......

Alexi Murdoch- Time Without Consequence...... Pretty mellow, similar to Nick Drake
Laura Veirs............ this needs no introduction.
Natacha Atlas....... I haven't heard a lot of her stuff, but what I have heard fucking rules. understand.
Sam Prekop. it's the shit.


ok that's enough for now. Check ya

lovethecity

I like the word "anomaly"
...and thirty dollar haircuts

The other day at work, my boss used the word "anomaly". I don't remember what she was talking about, but for all intents it is no longer necessary to know. It aroused my interest as the use of some words will do. I couldn't remember exactly what it meant at first, so my co-worker told me to look it up. So I pulled up dictionary.com and checked it out. To paraphrase the definition, it means 'a deviation from the norm'.

This word has come in quite handy lately, and has been particularly amusing when I use it at work. When I say 'amusing' I mean that I was amused by it. It is doubtful that anyone else has been amused by my vocabulary. I have, however, been able to use it effectively in conversation with my boss at least three times this past week and it did evoke some joviality.

Let's move on. I've been getting my hair cut at a prominent and reputable Cincinnati salon, located in Northside. Actually, I have no idea if they're reputable or prominent, but to me their prices evoke such esteem. This past week I needed to get a little trim. I'm trying to allow my hair to grow a bit longer, but you know how it goes. The hair just gets thicker and sloppier for a while there before the desired result is achieved. To make a long story short, I find out that I can just make an appointment for a "maintenance" cut and they won't even charge for it. But for some reason I still got charged full price for this cut. Even though I was only in there for a few minutes and my neck was basically broken after sitting in the hair washing chair thing. Usually I can bare the neck pain because I thoroughly enjoy getting my hair washed by a third party individual. But my usual stylist is a girl, and this guy was, well, a guy. He just didn't quite have the touch. But I must admit, he gave me some useful information and his professionalism reminded me of my own. ha sike I don't know what that means. but he was professional and that was good.

I'll leave you now with a quote. I don't remember who originally said it, but I heard it from a hilarious co-worker. "You can lead a West-sider to a hair salon, but you can't make him get his hair cut."
sure, it's just a variation on some ol' cliche shit but it's so Cincinnati appropriate that I had to include it. And the (semi)final concluding remark is: Don't ever go to Great Clips. Six dollars for a haircut is not a deal, it's an anomaly.

Love,
The City.

I was about 13 years old when this happened. I had just fallen asleep, but then I woke up. I was alone in my room and it was dark. I heard this strange repeating sound that resembled an unusually high voice, kind of alien-like. Needless to say I was scared as hell, and the sound kept getting louder and faster. It felt like someone or something was in the room and was getting closer and closer to me. I wanted to roll over and maybe put the pillow over my head, but when I tried to do it I couldn't move. I figured I was just so scared that I wouldn't let myself move. So I tried to relax and tried it again, but still I couldn't move at all. Eventually I was able to move, and the sound was gone.

I jumped from the bed and turned the light on. I think I even went into my parents' room like I did when I was 6 and having a bad dream. I sat on my bed just looking around my room, still scared as hell. A couple friends and I had been messing with a Ouija board a day or two before that, so I thought we might have pissed off some ghost or something. Even though I didn't really believe in stuff like that, it was the only explanation I could think of. I think I eventually got back to sleep peacefully that night, but I still remember that terrifying night pretty vividly.

After having a number of similar, though not nearly as terrifying, episodes over the next few years, I somehow came across a post on LiveJournal describing a very similar experience. The author attributed it to a condition called "Sleep Paralysis". It's also referred to as "Awareness during Sleep Paralysis."

Upon further research, I discovered that it is a relatively common occurance, though some people get it more often than others. I read about it on Wikipedia. Here's the link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis

But if you don't feel like reading that I'll quote a bit from it below:
"Sleep paralysis is a condition characterized by paralysis of the body shortly after waking up (known as hypnopompic paralysis) or, less often, shortly before falling asleep (known as hypnagogic paralysis). Physiologically, it is closely related to the normal paralysis that occurs during REM sleep, also known as REM atonia."

Hmm, that explains the not being able to move..

"In addition, this state is usually accompanied by certain specific kinds of hallucinations."
Among the hallucinations cited are:

"Most common
Vividness
Fear

Common
Sensing a "presence" (often malevolent)
Pressure/weight on body (especially the chest). See for example the painting in the beginning of this article.
A sensation of not being able to breathe
Impending sense of doom/death
Fairly common Auditory hallucinations (often footsteps or indistinct voices, or pulsing noises). Auditory hallucinations which are described as noise instead of hallucinations of legible sounds, are often described to be similar to auditory hallucinations caused by Nitrous Oxide by persons who have experienced both. Visual hallucinations such as lights, people or shadows walking around the room "

Fear, impending sense of doom, indistinct voices, pulsing noises, shadows walking around the room. I've experienced all these, and its fuckin scary. I still experience this sometimes. Its never as scary as it was the first few times when I didn't know what was happening. It's more of a nuisance now, but it still scares me while it's happening. I don't usually hear the sounds anymore, which was probably the scariest of all.

I just found some info about people using the awareness during sleep paralysis as a gateway to Out of Body Experiences or Lucid Dreams. I'm pretty interested in dreams and different states of consciousness and experiences in general, so I think I'll read up on this stuff and see how I can scare the shit out of myself some more. I mean enjoy it. Oh yea, and Wikipedia says that almost everyone will experience Sleep Paralysis at least once or twice in their lifetime, so if you've ever experienced it please do tell me about it. Right here on this blog even. That's what blogs are for, communication. So do it!

I hope you enjoyed the longest blog ever. I just wanted to talk about this thing which bothers me, yet intrigues me. I hope I don't become narcoleptic though.

Love,
TheCity

Hi there. I guess this is my blogger blog or blogspot spot. Today I'd like to talk about the word "pretentious". Apparently I just now learned how to spell it. Gotta have that dictionary.com tab open, ya know? Alright, my browser doesn't support tabs. I have a bumper sticker on my Internet [Ford] Explorer that says "I'd rather be using Mozilla". A little iHumor for ya.

Ok so what's with people using the word "pretentious" all the time. It seems like people who use that word a lot are being verbally pretentious. I know a lot of words AND I can use them correctly in everyday speech! look at me go!

I'm only joshing around. I don't think I know of any one person that overuses the word. I've just heard or seen it many times in the past week or two. Plus I encounter more people with the opposite problem. That is, lack of verbal skills and vocabulary.

So this is just an Intro to my blogger blog. It's called Love, the City. 'The City' is also my blogger ID. Get it? Anyhow, I suppose most of my posts will be in a similar format to this one, broken down as follows:

First I greet the reader, then I introduce the topic of the day's post.
Next I stray off-topic, talk about myself, and/or make stupid jokes.
Then I come back to the topic, make a poorly planned point, and maybe mock a hypothetical person.
After that, I make another point which is incongruous with my first point, or totally discounts it all together.
So I've made a perfect circle of idiocy, and at the end I say:

Love, The City